Stanley Rother

Stanley Francis Rother (27 March 1935-28 July 1981) was an American Roman Catholic priest from Oklahoma who was murdered by a right-wing Guatemalan death squad in 1981 during the Guatemalan Civil War.

Biography
Stanley Francis Rother was born in Okarche, Oklahoma on 27 March 1935, and he studied at a seminary in San Antonio, Texas. On 25 May 1963, he was ordained as a Roman Catholic priest, and, in 1968, he was sent to serve on a mission to the Tz'utujil people of Guatemala. He learned both Spanish and the Tz'utujil languages, and he served as a priest in Santiago Atitlan from 1968 on. From 1973, he celebrated Mass in the Tz'utujil language and also translated the New Testament into the natives' language, and his light complexion and his habit of smoking a pipe made him a highly recognizable figure in the Tz'utujil community. During the Guatemalan Civil War, the right-wing dictatorship persecuted Native Americans, whom they claimed were sympathetic to the communist rebels, and his church's radio station was smashed and its director murdered, while several of his catechists and parishioners disappeared before being found murdered. In 1981, despite being aware of his name being eighth on the name of the right-wing death squads' kill list, Rother decided to return to Guatemala, believing that a shepherd could not run at the first sign of danger. On 28 July 1981, shortly after midnight, gunmen broke into the rectory of Rother's church and shot him twice in the head after a brief struggle; he was one of 10 priests murdered in Guatemala that year. On 23 September 2017, he was beatified by the Roman Catholic Church for his martyrdom.